NEW YORK, Oct 30 (APP):Even as support for his impeachment grows, United States President Donald Trump continues to be backed by a seemingly unshakable core of supporters– Republicans, evangelicals and rural dwellers — who deny he has done anything wrong and agree he is the target of a political “lynching,” according to new poll released Tuesday.
Americans are split in the survey about whether Trump should be convicted by the Senate in an impeachment trial and removed from office: 46 per cent in favour and 47 precent against, USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll finds.
USA TODAY pointed out that while the president’s core supporters don’t make up a majority of the electorate, they do give him a political foundation that energizes him.
At issue is a July phone call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in which Trump is said to have pushed for investigations into former Vice President Joe Biden, a political rival who is seeking Democratic Party’s presidential nomination, and his son. In the days before that call, Trump ordered that US aid to Ukraine be frozen.
Trump has insisted he did nothing wrong and has denied that any requests for help in procuring damaging information about the Bidens were tied to the aid freeze.
Trump has sought, without evidence, to implicate Biden and his son Hunter in the kind of corruption that has long plagued Ukraine. Hunter Biden served on the board of a Ukrainian gas company at the same time his father was leading the Obama administration’s diplomatic dealings with Kyiv.
Despite damaging new testimony, however, 30 percent to 40 percent of those surveyed remain solidly on Trump’s side. That is a significant asset for the president as the House of Representatives prepares to vote Thursday to affirm the formal impeachment investigation.
The president’s solid core of supporters don’t comprise a majority of the electorate, but they do provide a political foundation that energizes him – witness his speeches that stretch an hour and longer at raucous rallies – and helps limit defections from other Republican officials.
In the poll, nearly four in 10 say his phone call pressuring the Ukrainian president to investigate possible interference in the 2016 election and former Vice President Joe Biden is itself an impeachable offence.
But another 31 percent say there was nothing wrong with the conversation, echoing Trump’s insistence that it was “perfect.” Thirty-seven percent say the House should stop investigating the president and his administration entirely.
“It seems like the inquiry is a tremendous waste of time and money,” said George Roma, 55, a small-business owner from central Florida and a Republican. “I’m baffled why they continue to do this for three years.”
The telephone poll of 1,000 registered voters Oct. 23-26 has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
Last week, even Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell took the rare step of distancing himself from a tweet by Trump that likened his impeachment to “a lynching.”
In the poll, though, 40 percent say they agree with the racially charged tweet; 54 percent disagree.
The language that caused wide consternation was seen by some supporters as just another sign of Trump’s willingness to disrupt the status quo, a quality they embrace.
In the new USA TODAY/Suffolk survey, Americans of all stripes are inclined to think the House won’t end up voting to impeach Trump, 56%-37%.
Most Democrats and most Republicans agree he’s not likely to be removed from office. Nearly three in four of all those surveyed, 73%, predict he won’t be.